According to Lena Mellin of the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet, if you want to sound smart at the dinner table, the top comment to make is “In case anyone’s wondering, it’s all about China now” (see below for the original). If the others at the dinner table ask for an explanation, you should tell them: “That China is sailing up as a superpower alongside the US, a position that the Soviet Union held back in the day, is becoming more and more clear. One indicator is that the luxury brand Versace is leaving Japan after 30 years in the country. But during the past three years they’ve opened 20 stores in China”.
I won’t go into a discussion on China’s supposed superpower status, but there certainly are a lot of luxury brands here — here in Wuhan in particular there seem to be more luxury shops that the purchasing power of the population should be able to support. A few possible explanations are that 1) even though the average income is still relatively low by Western standards (and relative to the price of a Versace bag), there’s a significant and growing chunk of the population who do have money to burn — maybe not a big chunk in terms of percent, but given the size of the population, enough people for there to be a big market for luxury brands, 2) the cost of opening and running a Versace store or luxury shopping mall is much lower in Wuhan than in New York, and so the sales volume perhaps doesn’t need to be as high to make it profitable, and 3) a lot of brands are trying to establish themselves in China in anticipation of the day when purchasing power will be much higher, and might be willing to open shops with lowers profits or even at a loss in order to build their brand here.
Definitely an issue that needs more research — anyone interested in funding a Versace shopping spree?
”Om någon undrar så är det Kina som gäller.”
Att Kina håller på att segla upp som en supermakt vid sidan av USA, en position som Sovjetunionen hade på sin tid, blir allt tydligare. Ett av dem är att lyxmodehuset Versace lämnar Japan efter 30 år. Men under de tre senaste åren har de öppnat 20 butiker i Kina.